📈 $300k in Ad Sales: The Exact Process We Used

*cracks knuckles*

It’s been a minute.

My wife had our fourth kid, Lucy.

Our kids’ ages are 5 ½, 4 ½, 16 months and 3 months.

It’s as crazy as you probably think it is.

But I’m back to work, so let’s get down to business 👨‍🍳

Surprise

We quietly built a newsletter ad network in the faith-based niche.

And we’ve done ~$300k in ad sales in the last 6 months.

About half of that came in Q2.

Here’s what I’m covering in the next few newsletters:

• Today: Why we started an ad network

• Today: How we’re selling (our exact process)

• Next time: What we’re selling (and how we’re growing our newsletter profitably)

Let’s dig in.

Why we started an ad network

We started it as an open-ended experiment.

It made sense for us because:

1. We already operate in the space (our growth agency)

2. Some of our clients need this service (retention)

3. We need to do ad sales for our own newsletter anyway (Malachi Daily)

4. It’s a niche that other ad networks can't service as well as we can (relationships + knowledge)

Unsurprisingly, we found it much easier to get interest from sponsors when we brought 600k+ subscribers to the table instead of just 50k.

And over the last ~7 months, we took a crash course in ad sales.

And over the next few newsletters, I’m sharing what we’ve learned.

Our process for selling ads

A lot of people overcomplicate ad sales. I want to lay out how simple it can be.

Here’s what we’re doing that’s working 👇️ 

1. Make a list of ideal sponsors 🗒️ 

🎯 Goal: Identify potential sponsors to make Step 2 easy.

We have two tiers of prospects that go into a simple Google Sheet.

→ Tier 1: Orgs who are already sponsoring newsletters

They’re by far the easiest sell.

Focus 80% of your effort here.

They already already have a team, budget, process and performance benchmarks for newsletter ads.

So you don’t have to sell them on newsletter ads. You just need to sell them on your newsletter.

How do we find them?

We subscribe to newsletters in our niche. When we notice a sponsor we think would be a good fit for our audience(s), we reach out.

We’ve done this and it has yielded bigger deals that close faster (and a clearer path to a long-term partnership).

→ Tier 2: Orgs who already do paid marketing on other channels (podcasts, YouTube, Meta)

These have been harder, slower sells.

But if you’re in a small or very specific niche, this does open up your pool of options to find solid fits for your audience.

It will likely take longer to land deals on average, but you might find some hidden gems (less competition) and form a fruitful long-term partnership.

Apply the 80/20 rule.

Prioritize Tier 1, but shoot some shots with orgs in Tier 2.

2. Reach out 📧 

🎯 Goal: Book a sales call.

Based on the list from Step 1, follow this process 👇️ 

→ Get an intro. If possible, ask someone you know for an introduction to their decision-maker for newsletter sponsorships.

If you have no mutual connections or a path to a warm intro, no worries.

→ Do one or both of these:

• Pay $99 for LinkedIn premium. Our response rate has been highest here. People see mutual connections and your face, so trust is higher.

• Reach out via email (use Apollo or Clay to get emails if needed)

→ Write the message.

If you think you can help them reach their goals, be a human…Tell them that. And tell them why.

Hey Mike, I saw your ad in [industry newsletter]. I run a newsletter with a similar audience - 50k active subscribers [in industry/target demographic].

We’ve been working with [X and Y other sponsors in industry] and have seen solid results ([1.5% ad CTR]). I think our audience would respond well to [their product, service, offering].

Worth a chat?

Happy to answer q’s via email, or go ahead and book 15 minutes on my calendar.

Best,

Jake from State Farm

My favorite sales advice? Just tell the truth.

You can’t predict the future, but you can present the facts (past data) and a reasonable case for why you think you’ll work well together.

This simple outreach has led to 60+ calls and hundreds of thousands in revenue.

3. Sales call ☎️ 

🎯 Goal: Determine fit. If it’s a fit, land a 2-3 placement test.

→ First, we frame the conversation within the context of their goals and priorities.

Which means the first thing we ask is for them to share their team’s biggest goals, priorities and what would constitute a big win for them.

Our goal is to make them look like a genius to their boss.

Once we fully understand their goals, we walk them through the 2 options for working with us and describe how those options would help them reach their goal.*

*much more on this in the next newsletter

→ We then share what a test would look like:

• Pricing (how much it’ll cost them)

• A range for expected results (what they’ll get in return for their investment)

  • E.g., sends, opens, impressions, clicks, conversions

When our confidence is high that we’ll crush a campaign with a sponsor, we often lower the barrier to entry and reduce the risk a new sponsor would take on by:

• Offering a discount on the initial test (10-20%)

• Guaranteeing performance (often, this looks like guaranteeing a certain cost per lead or number of clicks)

The LAST thing sponsors want to do is waste money.

When you reduce the chances of that or remove risk altogether with a performance guarantee, they exhale.

When we genuinely believe they’ll be happy with our performance, we’re not worried about making less money or taking on risk ourselves.

→ After answering questions they have (assuming they’re a fit), we outline clear next steps:

• Timeline: We discuss when they want to run the placements.

• We walk them through what the rest of the process will look like:

  • We’ll send an IO (insertion order - legal document outlining the agreement between an advertiser and a publisher for a specific ad campaign) for a 2-3 email test within their budget

  • We’ll provide a dedicated portal in Sponsy to manage assets (copy, links, images) for the placements

  • After placements run, we’ll send a report with results along with suggestions for improving performance the next time around.

The best sponsors are a fit across these dimensions:

• They have budget to pay your prices

• They offer a product or service your audience wants/needs

• They want to move quickly into a test (2-6 weeks)

• They have budget and potential for long-term partnership

⚠️ Warning: One-off tests, one-time deals and working with bad fit sponsors a bad idea.

It might feel like you’re making money and being productive, but it can often be a huge waste of time (for you and the sponsor).

That’s why we always set the expectation on the first call that we’re looking for long-term partners.

I’d much rather land one 12-month partnership than sell twelve different sponsors on a one-month deal.

Especially when you’re in a niche, partnerships > transactions.

It might take some time to learn how to tell the difference between good and bad fits but…

Don’t be afraid to turn away a bad fit.

Spending time and effort working with a sponsor you are confident will be a bad fit is not worth it:

• You erode trust with your audience

• You waste your time (and theirs)

• Every minute you spend working with them is a minute not spent finding or working with the great-fit sponsors that are out there.

The more you follow this process (or your version of it), the better you get at closing a good fit on the first call.

And the more you do this, the better you’ll get at telling potential sponsors they’re not a fit.

Recap

Here’s a recap of how we’re selling:

• Curate a list of ideal sponsors already running ads in newsletters

• Reach out like a human, telling them why you think you should work together

• Invite them to book a call

• On the sales call:

  • Learn what their goals are and what a win would be (aka, what would they need to see to want to book a second deal?)

  • Share pricing (+ expected results if possible) for an initial test

    • Lower the barrier to entry by:

      • Offering a discount on an initial test OR

      • Guaranteeing performance

  • Make it crystal clear what happens next

• After the sales call:

  • Send a summary of results (sends, opens, impressions, clicks)

  • If the campaign involved a conversion event (leads, customers, donors), ask what results they saw

  • Include specific ideas on how you would improve performance in future placements

  • If successful, invite them to book a 15-min call to review results and map out an ongoing relationship

What’s next

Next time, I’ll dive into exactly what we’re selling.

It’s what has allowed us to:

• Grow Malachi Daily profitably from the moment we acquire a subscriber

• Sell multiple $50k+ deals with long-term partners

The best part?

Even small audiences can do this.

Read: If we had 0 subscribers today, this is exactly what we’d be doing to fund our growth.

• For small newsletters in the early days, this could be your ticket to profitable (or at least breakeven) growth.

• For larger newsletters, this can be an additional revenue stream or a new way to package your ad sales.

All that to say, you won’t want to miss part 2.

Cheers,

Isaac + Kieran 🫡 

P.S. Our newsletter growth agency works with businesses, creators, and nonprofits spending $5k+ per month on paid growth. We’d love to help you fill your audience with people who click, share and buy.

If you want help growing your newsletter, book a call here with the two guys pictured above 🫡